Book review - Consumer and SME Credit Law by Nora Beausang

• Pages: pp 164 - 167
• Published date: 12 July 2022
• Date: 12 July 2022

164

Consumer and SME Credit Law

JOSH HOGAN*

Consumer and SME Credit Law by Nora Beausang (Bloomsbury Professional,

2021)

e Labyrinth of Ancient Greece is famous as the elaborate system of passageways

and blind alleys that trapped the Minotaur, a creature with a human body and

a bull’s head. In order to free Athens of its terrible obligation to provide human

sacrices to the Minotaur, the hero eseus ventured into this confusing maze

from which no-one had ever come out alive. Crucially, he had the help of Ariadne

who provided him with a ball of string to mark his way; he slew the Minotaur, and

retraced his steps to escape the Labyrinth.

While the life of a nancial services regulatory practitioner such as myself tends

to be less swashbuckling than that of an Ancient Greek hero, the feeling of being

caught in a labyrinth is familiar. It is with good reason that Nora Beausang, in

her excellent book, Consumer and SME Credit Law, variously describes the legal

framework of consumer and SME protections relevant to the provision of cash loans

as ‘labyrinthine’, as well as ‘confusing’, ‘fragmented’ and ‘entirely unsatisfactory’. It is

dicult to argue with her recommendation for a forensic and holistic review with

an eye to eventual consolidation.

In the meantime, we are fortunate that, in Consumer and SME Credit Law, Ms

Beausang has provided us with a substantial ball of string to help us nd our way

around the labyrinth: this is a weighty tome extending to 2,362 pages. It is replete

with useful information and analysis, especially to explain the oen-complex

interrelationships between the legislative and regulatory provisions relevant to

consumer and SME credit. Notwithstanding its size, it is notable that the book’s

scope is conned to the provision of credit by way of cash loans (including

overdras and credit card facilities) only. Other types of credit such as hire

purchase and invoice discounting are outside of scope, and so too are the activities

of crowdfunding platforms, credit unions, debt management rms, moneylenders

and credit intermediaries.

Ms Beausang modestly notes in her preface that she did not set out to create the

work in its current extensive form. e book began as a proposed ‘extra couple

of chapters’ in her husband William Johnston’s book Banking and Security Law

* Josh Hogan is a partner with McCann FitzGerald LLP. He specialises in nancial services regulation

and ntech. He is a former member of the Editorial Board of the Hibernian Law Journal. Any

opinions expressed in this article are those of the author alone.